Wall St soars as Fed dampens fears over hike – New York Report
US STOCKS soared yesterday, with major indexes posting their biggest one-day jumps of 2014 after the Federal Reserve reassured investors that its first interest rate hike would not come until it deemed the economy could withstand it.
The Fed’s less aggressive posture lit a fire under US stocks, which had struggled in recent days, and helped drive the S&P to its best one-day gain in nearly a year .
The Dow Jones industrial average rose 274.83 points, or 1.64 per cent, to 16,994.22, the S&P 500 gained 33.79 points, or 1.75 per cent, to 1,968.89, and the Nasdaq Composite added 83.39 points, or 1.9 per cent, to 4,468.59. On Tuesday, the Dow slumped by more than 270 points.
Sectors tied to the pace of economic growth led the day. Financials rose 1.8 per cent while technology was up two percent. Among specific names, JPMorgan Chase & Co added 1.9 per cent to $60.40 while Apple was up 2.1 per cent to $100.80.
Sears Holdings, the parent company of Sears and Kmart, dropped 4.8 per cent, to $28.85 after news reports that its vendors had started to halt shipments to the retailer.
Sears has struggled for several months and has been selling off assets to raise cash to pay its expenses.
But Gap plunged 8.5 per cent, to $38.40 in after-market trading after the clothing retail company announced that its chief executive Glenn Murphy was stepping down early next year.